Nothing At All
by rightxhere
Summary: Sam and Ronon are trapped offworld after the F302 they were flying in crash landed on a hostile planet.


**Title: **Nothing At All  
**Author: **Demelza  
**Disclaimer:** Stargate SG1, Stargate Atlantis and all their characters belong to their respective owners. No infringements of these copyrights are intended, and are used here without permission of the author.  
**Rating: **M  
**Pairing:** Ronon/Sam  
**Warnings:** some language  
**Spoilers:** Threads (S8 of SG1)  
**Written for:** triplesnap on LJ  
**Prompt:** stranded off-world, Sam injured, shirtless-Ronon  
**Summary:** Sam and Ronon are trapped off-world after the F-302 they were flying in crash landed on a hostile planet.  
**Author's Notes:** I'm very new to Atlantis, so I hope my Ronon Dex isn't too OC. As for the pov, well that's first.  
**Beta:** Many thanks to gh-lover for her awesome beta skills! And to Elizabeth, Bee and Claire for reading it over for me. You girls rock! I would go insane without you all :) Any and all errors are my own.

\/

"It'll be dark soon."

Ronon's voice pulls me from painful memories of times that have recently passed, of my father's funeral, and saying goodbye to Cassie as I left for Atlantis. I wait until my vision adjusts to the darkness surrounding me before letting my lungs fill with a small breath of air.

Sitting here, watching him where he stands in a stilled silence, I can see his breathing is slightly labored. I have no memory of how we got to the small cove in the cliff where we are, or how he managed to carry me so far, I just know I'm glad he did.

My mind drifts from one thought to the next. To him shaking my hand that first time we met, to our last minutes on board the Daedalus when the General gave the orders for us to follow through with the mission we were waiting to execute.

The details are all a blur now. They became a blur when Ronon and I came through the electromagnetic radiation in the planet's atmosphere and somehow lost all communications with the Daedalus. Those few minutes felt like hours as I fought to gain some kind of control of the F-302. I'm not even sure how I got it to land, but sitting here now with my back against dry clay I know, somehow, we made it through the crash-landing.

Forcing the splintered memories from my mind, I slowly take in a breath and focus on Ronon.

The darkening crimson sky behind him has just enough light to highlight his dreadlocks as he turns to face me. It's not until he steps away from the rock edge and crouches at my right side that I can see his face clearly. The sight makes me smile a small, pained smile, when I hear myself asking, "How long was I out?"

There's a flicker of uncertainty in his hazel eyes, as though he's trying to find the right way to tell me. When, "Not long. Fifteen, maybe twenty minutes," he says hoarsely.

Nodding slowly, I feel searing pain in my shoulder as I try to move my right arm.

"_Colonel_," Ronon says, his voice desperate. It's laced with a hint of panic that in the four weeks we've known each other I've never heard before.

"Seven," I give him in answer to his concerned gaze. I try to catch my breath, when I repeat, "Seven."

The small, faintly disbelieving smile that forms on his tired face after a confused moment is enough to tell me he understands, and I find myself sighing a soft sigh of relief.

And that's when they hit me. _Memories_...they drift into my mind, reminding me of why I'd blacked out. Of why we're in this cove, and why all we can see for miles around us is the tops of trees.

Shortly after the newly modified F-302 Ronon and I were in had crashed, we'd been attempting to find our way to a village we saw through the clouds almost two hundred clicks south-west of our crash position.

We were close to the halfway mark, when we came under attack by a small group of men dressed in attire close to what Ronon himself always wore. Men he confessed, as we drew our weapons, the likes of which he had come up against some many years previously.

They weren't much of a force to be reckoned with. Heck, they didn't even seem too phased by the fact we were armed with personal handguns that packed a stronger punch than their swords and bows. They fought. And they fought pretty damn well, too.

We turned the tides quickly, though. When we started, we were two against nine. By the time we'd dealt with the six swordsmen, there were only three bowmen left.

I'm not sure how everything had gone bad after that. My weapon jammed and Ronon pulled me behind a tree, pinned me against the trunk for protection while he shot two of the bowmen. Somewhere in between me trying to catch my breath and trying to get my gun working again, I was hit.

At first I didn't feel it, not until the dire need to vomit came and I was feeling the burning, piercing pain in my right shoulder.

I was numb. I couldn't breathe. And, _I was falling_.

The battle was over, Ronon was at my side and he was asking me the question, 'How bad is the pain, on a scale of one to ten?'

Only, there was nothing in me that could answer. There was nothing but pain as I blacked out and found myself waking here in this cove with him.

Taking in a sharp breath, the thoughts fade from my mind and I look at my shoulder. The arrow is still there. Still sticking out of my shoulder.

"Guess I—I wasn't out long enough to...to remove it, huh?" I hear myself ask.

"Unfortunately...no." Ronon lifts a small wooden bowl with water in it, and I place my left hand on his wrist to still him. He gives me one of his rare smiles as he explains, "There was an old camp site on the way up here. I didn't think the owners would mind if we used it for water."

"Oh."

He raises the bowl of cold water to my lips, lifts it slowly so I can manage to take a small sip. And really, that's all I can take. I cough at the strangely metallic taste and he apologizes as he sets the bowl on the ground.

"Thank you," I say.

Ronon offers me another small smile, when he says, "We need to remove that arrow, Colonel Carter."

Nodding again, I sigh softly. "It can't stay in," I agree with him. "But, even when we get it out...what are we going to use to seal it? If we don't...I don't doubt I'll bleed out and..."

He cuts me off, not letting me finish. "You let me worry about that," he says.

Staring at him, I resign with a weak, "Okay."

Ronon inches closer to me, touches my shoulder just beneath the entrance point of the arrow. It hurts already, and I grit my teeth knowing there's worse yet to come. "Keep hold of me," he says, his gaze locking on mine. "Hold onto me tight."

"I will," I say. Taking in a few deepening breaths, I finally nod and grip his shirt in my left hand. "Do it."

"I'm sorry," he whispers, and I gasp as his gaze leaves mine and focuses on the arrow.

I close my eyes and swallow hard, when I feel Ronon place his hand against my shoulder. _This is it_, I tell myself. It's then that the arrow seems to tug, causing a flicker of grating pain up into my neck, when suddenly he's pushing the arrow through to the other side and I scream out in agony.

My shoulder feels like it's being ripped apart and again I can't breathe. All I want is for this to be over.

There's another tug on the arrow, but this time I hear the crack of wood as Ronon snaps off the arrow tip. My eyes, rushing with tears, open to his and I can see the guilt in his eyes. The guilt that tells me he hates that he has to do this to a woman who's only been working on Atlantis for a month now.

"Now comes the hard part," he says, almost breathlessly.

The tears streaming down my cheeks feel like they're burning, just like my lungs. "Fast...p-pull it out fast..." I breathe, and I just pray to whatever god is listening that he does.

And that's when he lifts his hand to my face and gently caresses my cheek. I feel more tears building, and I open my mouth to say something, _say anything_, only the words won't come out. The pain is too much and I can scarcely catch my breath...but there's something, something in his eyes. A comfort. A look that says he knows what this feels like, and he's going to pull me through it.

That's when I feel my jaw unclench a little and I nod for him to continue.

He leaves one last faint caress against my cheek before moving his hand back to the arrow, while his other hand rests against my shoulder again. My chest tightens at the fear of what's to come – though in my mind I don't think it can be any worse than it has been already.

"Here we go," Ronon says, and I watch his lips as he counts down from three.

_Three._

My breath seems to grate in my chest and I gasp for air.

_Two._

The throbbing in my shoulder intensifies as my heart begins to race faster.

_One._

And he pulls on the arrow. The pain is more than I imagine it to be, and though I'm crying out in pain everything is fading...my world is growing black and then..._I feel nothing._

"Colonel..."

My eyes open slowly to a dark sky with a quarter and full moon high above us. Ronon's leaning over me with a deep, concerned frown creasing his brow.

"I wondered when you'd wake up," he says.

I try to move, but I feel weighted down. "Wh...what happened?" I ask him.

"The pain was too much for you," he answers me. At his words, I expect to see a callous look like I'd seen from my C.O during my time in the Air Force Academy. Only I don't see malice. All I see is concern, relief, and...something else my head can't quite process. "But, you're okay now."

His words cause me to swallow and I stare up at him. When, my heart races in panic. "The bleeding...?"

He grins, saying, "I told you to let me worry about that."

In my mind, I'm wanting to ask him all the details of what he did and how he did it, but I just nod and thank him quietly. My shoulder still hurts like hell, but it's nothing compared to what it was. Or maybe I'm still that far out of it, and I just don't feel as much as I would otherwise.

"You were out for almost an hour, this time," he tells me.

"Thank you...for," I say, pausing as I turn my head to look at him a little better. "For everything."

"Don't thank me yet," he says. "The temperature's been dropping steadily since nightfall. It started snowing a little while ago."

"Snowing...?" I blink and look out to my right. There are thick clouds passing in front of the two moons, and I can see stray streaks of white passing over us as the snow falls. "...we'll freeze," I hear myself whisper.

"We can use each other's body heat to keep warm," Ronon says, and I look up at him. "McKay and I once had to..." He clears his throat, and the visual of him and McKay shirtless in the snow while trying to keep warm makes me chuckle.

"Sorry," I say. "You're right, though." And the thought _It's not like this hasn't happened to me before either_, enters my mind.

He sits back then, just enough to pull his shirt off and I stare at him in shock. Every part of my better thinking tells me I knew he was a trained Satedan warrior, but the truth is...he's nothing like I'd pictured him to be under all those rustic clothes.

_Nothing at all._


End file.
